global metadata, etc.¶

doc: https://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg-formats.html#Metadata-1, https://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg.html#Advanced-options

see also: https://ffmpeg.org/doxygen/4.1/id3v2_8c_source.html

Warning

As I mentioned at Text expansion, there is no (straightforward) way to render the global metadata as an image with ffmpeg, so, the act of inserting global metadata into media files is basically for tools other than ffmpeg, isn’t it?

But give up to think “for any tool other than ffmpeg”.

For example, for non-English handling, Windows Explorer and ffmpeg are different. (ffmpeg reads everything as utf-8 and writes with utf-8. But there are probably tools out there that write as mbcs, and Windows Explorer can read it correctly somehow, of cource ffmpeg can’t.)

ffmetadata file¶

To dump metadata and then to load it back, the most easy way is to use a ffmetadata file, this is the same way as shown chapters:

ffm1.txt¶

;FFMETADATA1

; title (TIT2)
title=Peel

; track (TRCK)
track=2/14

; album (TALB)
album=Slowly

; genre (TCON)
genre=Rock

; artist (TPE1) -> "Contribution artists"
artist=Niko\; Andy

; album_artist (TPE2) -> "Album Artist"
album_artist=Lou

embed global metadata from ffmetadata, and then extract metadata from it¶

[me@host: ~]$ ffmpeg -hide_banner -y -i input.mp3 -i ffm1.txt -map_metadata 1 output.mp3
Input #0, mp3, from 'input.mp3':
  Metadata:
    encoder         : Lavf57.71.100
  Duration: 00:01:59.69, start: 0.025057, bitrate: 127 kb/s
    Stream #0:0: Audio: mp3, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16p, 127 kb/s
    Metadata:
      encoder         : Lavf
Input #1, ffmetadata, from 'ffm1.txt':
  Metadata:
    title           : Peel
    track           : 2/14
    album           : Slowly
    genre           : Rock
    artist          : Niko; Andy
    album_artist    : Lou
  Duration: N/A, start: 0.000000, bitrate: N/A
Stream mapping:
  Stream #0:0 -> #0:0 (mp3 (native) -> mp3 (libmp3lame))
Press [q] to stop, [?] for help
Output #0, mp3, to 'output.mp3':
  Metadata:
    TIT2            : Peel
    TRCK            : 2/14
    TALB            : Slowly
    TCON            : Rock
    TPE1            : Niko; Andy
    TPE2            : Lou
    TSSE            : Lavf57.71.100
    Stream #0:0: Audio: mp3 (libmp3lame), 44100 Hz, stereo, s16p
    Metadata:
      encoder         : Lavc57.89.100 libmp3lame
... (snip) ...
[me@host: ~]$ ffmpeg -hide_banner -y -i output.mp3 -f ffmetadata - 2> /dev/null
title=Peel
track=2/14
album=Slowly
genre=Rock
artist=Niko\; Andy
album_artist=Lou
encoder=Lavf57.71.100

embed global metadata from ffmetadata with ID3 version 2.3 (not 2.4), and then extract metadata from it¶

[me@host: ~]$ ffmpeg -hide_banner -y -i input.mp3 -i ffm1.txt -map_metadata 1 \
> -id3v2_version 3 \
> output_id3v2_3.mp3
Input #0, mp3, from 'input.mp3':
  Metadata:
    encoder         : Lavf57.71.100
  Duration: 00:01:59.69, start: 0.025057, bitrate: 127 kb/s
    Stream #0:0: Audio: mp3, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16p, 127 kb/s
    Metadata:
      encoder         : Lavf
Input #1, ffmetadata, from 'ffm1.txt':
  Metadata:
    title           : Peel
    track           : 2/14
    album           : Slowly
    genre           : Rock
    artist          : Niko; Andy
    album_artist    : Lou
  Duration: N/A, start: 0.000000, bitrate: N/A
Stream mapping:
  Stream #0:0 -> #0:0 (mp3 (native) -> mp3 (libmp3lame))
Press [q] to stop, [?] for help
Output #0, mp3, to 'output_id3v2_3.mp3':
  Metadata:
    TIT2            : Peel
    TRCK            : 2/14
    TALB            : Slowly
    TCON            : Rock
    TPE1            : Niko; Andy
    TPE2            : Lou
    TSSE            : Lavf57.71.100
    Stream #0:0: Audio: mp3 (libmp3lame), 44100 Hz, stereo, s16p
    Metadata:
      encoder         : Lavc57.89.100 libmp3lame
... (snip) ...
[me@host: ~]$ ffmpeg -hide_banner -y -i output_id3v2_3.mp3 -f ffmetadata - 2> /dev/null
;FFMETADATA1
title=Peel
track=2/14
album=Slowly
genre=Rock
artist=Niko\; Andy
album_artist=Lou
encoder=Lavf57.71.100

see also: ffmpeg-formats.html#mp3, ffaddmeta.py

ffm2.txt¶

;FFMETADATA1

; TIT2 (title)
TIT2=Peel

; TRCK (track)
TRCK=2/14

; TALB (album)
TALB=Slowly

; TCON (genre)
TCON=Rock

; TPE1 (artist) -> "Contribution artists"
TPE1=Niko\; Andy

; TPE2 (album_artist) -> "Album Artist"
TPE2=Lou

embed global metadata from ffmetadata, and then extract metadata from it¶

[me@host: ~]$ ffmpeg -hide_banner -y -i input.mp3 -i ffm2.txt -map_metadata 1 output2.mp3
Input #0, mp3, from 'input.mp3':
  Metadata:
    encoder         : Lavf57.71.100
  Duration: 00:01:59.69, start: 0.025057, bitrate: 127 kb/s
    Stream #0:0: Audio: mp3, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16p, 127 kb/s
    Metadata:
      encoder         : Lavf
Input #1, ffmetadata, from 'ffm2.txt':
  Metadata:
    TIT2            : Peel
    TRCK            : 2/14
    TALB            : Slowly
    TCON            : Rock
    TPE1            : Niko; Andy
    TPE2            : Lou
  Duration: N/A, start: 0.000000, bitrate: N/A
Stream mapping:
  Stream #0:0 -> #0:0 (mp3 (native) -> mp3 (libmp3lame))
Press [q] to stop, [?] for help
Output #0, mp3, to 'output2.mp3':
  Metadata:
    TIT2            : Peel
    TRCK            : 2/14
    TALB            : Slowly
    TCON            : Rock
    TPE1            : Niko; Andy
    TPE2            : Lou
    TSSE            : Lavf57.71.100
    Stream #0:0: Audio: mp3 (libmp3lame), 44100 Hz, stereo, s16p
    Metadata:
      encoder         : Lavc57.89.100 libmp3lame
... (snip) ...
[me@host: ~]$ ffmpeg -hide_banner -y -i output2.mp3 -f ffmetadata - 2> /dev/null
;FFMETADATA1
title=Peel
track=2/14
album=Slowly
genre=Rock
artist=Niko\; Andy
album_artist=Lou
encoder=Lavf57.71.100

As mentioned above, “%{metadata}” can not use this information, but because ffmetadata files can be extracted as you see, of course you can:

using ‘textfile’ rather than ‘text’¶

#! /bin/sh
trap 'rm -f _meta.txt' 0 1 2 3 15

ifn="$1"

# extract ffmetadata
ffmpeg -y -i "${ifn}" -f ffmetadata _meta.txt

# draw the content of _meta.txt
ffplay "${ifn}" -vf "\
drawtext='
    font=monospace:
    fontsize=40:
    fontcolor=white:
    shadowcolor=blue:shadowx=2:shadowy=2:
    x=30:y=30:
    expansion=none:
    textfile=_meta.txt'
"

-metadata¶

add title¶

[me@host: ~]$ ffmpeg -hide_banner -y -i input.mp3 -metadata title="Peel Slowly and See" \
> -c copy output3.mp3
Input #0, mp3, from 'input.mp3':
  Metadata:
    encoder         : Lavf57.71.100
  Duration: 00:01:59.69, start: 0.025057, bitrate: 127 kb/s
    Stream #0:0: Audio: mp3, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16p, 127 kb/s
    Metadata:
      encoder         : Lavf
Output #0, mp3, to 'output3.mp3':
  Metadata:
    TIT2            : Peel Slowly and See
    TSSE            : Lavf57.71.100
    Stream #0:0: Audio: mp3, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16p, 127 kb/s
    Metadata:
      encoder         : Lavf
Stream mapping:
  Stream #0:0 -> #0:0 (copy)
... (snip) ...
[me@host: ~]$ ffmpeg -hide_banner -y -i output3.mp3 -f ffmetadata - 2>/dev/null
;FFMETADATA1
title=Peel Slowly and See
encoder=Lavf57.71.100

add metadata from ffm1.txt and then overide title with -metadata¶

[me@host: ~]$ ffmpeg -hide_banner -y -i input.mp3 -i ffm1.txt -map_metadata 1 \
> -metadata title="Peel Slowly and See" -c copy output4.mp3
Input #0, mp3, from 'input.mp3':
  Metadata:
    encoder         : Lavf57.71.100
  Duration: 00:01:59.69, start: 0.025057, bitrate: 127 kb/s
    Stream #0:0: Audio: mp3, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16p, 127 kb/s
    Metadata:
      encoder         : Lavf
Input #1, ffmetadata, from 'ffm1.txt':
  Metadata:
    title           : Peel
    track           : 2/14
    album           : Slowly
    genre           : Rock
    artist          : Niko; Andy
    album_artist    : Lou
  Duration: N/A, start: 0.000000, bitrate: N/A
Output #0, mp3, to 'output4.mp3':
  Metadata:
    TPE2            : Lou
    TRCK            : 2/14
    TALB            : Slowly
    TCON            : Rock
    TPE1            : Niko; Andy
    TIT2            : Peel Slowly and See
    TSSE            : Lavf57.71.100
    Stream #0:0: Audio: mp3, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16p, 127 kb/s
    Metadata:
      encoder         : Lavf
Stream mapping:
  Stream #0:0 -> #0:0 (copy)
... (snip) ...
[me@host: ~]$ ffmpeg -hide_banner -y -i output4.mp3 -f ffmetadata - 2>/dev/null
;FFMETADATA1
album_artist=Lou
track=2/14
album=Slowly
genre=Rock
artist=Niko\; Andy
title=Peel Slowly and See
encoder=Lavf57.71.100

global metadata, etc.¶

ffmetadata file¶

-metadata¶

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